My friend, Wayne Turmel, who hosts The Podcast Network's Cranky Middle Manager Show, gave me a heads-up on this week's provocative topic.  (Disclosure:  I've been a guest on Wayne's show, an interview you can download by clicking here.) 

On the show's most recent episode, Wayne visits with Judith Bardwick, author of One Foot Out the Door: How to Combat the Psychological Recession That's Alienating Employees and Hurting American Business.  During the session, Judith references a landmark Gallup survey on employee engagement, which divides the U.S. work force into three major groups:

• Engaged   These employees "work with passion and feel a profound connection" to their companies.  They tend to "drive innovation and move the organization forward."
• Not Engaged   This group has "checked out" mentally.  Though they’re there physically, these employees lack energy, passion, or commitment to the job.  They spend their time, as Wayne puts it, "doing [just] enough not to get fired."
• Actively Disengaged   These folks "aren't just unhappy [about their] work: they're busy acting out their unhappiness. Every day, [they] undermine . . . their engaged coworkers."

These categories may not alarm you.  But the distribution sure should.

Welcome to the HR Hall of Mirrors

I separated the description of the categories from the break-out numbers to give you a chance to think about your own company.  How would you distribute your people across the Gallup spectrum?

To help you estimate, consider the factors shown below.  They're a great starting point – since they happen to be the areas with the strongest correlation to employee engagement.  For each, I'll give you the Gallup definitions, expanded with information from our firm's database.

Note, by the way, that each factor has several layers.  The first criterion, or even the second, may seem easy to nail.  But, by the time you wend your way down the full list, you may have cause for pause.

The three key employee-engagement factors are as follows:

• Expectations
  Are your employees’ performance goals communicated clearly?  Does each employee have input into objectives and targets – and the resources needed to achieve them?  Does the employee consider these goals realistic, and in line with his or her understanding of the job?
• Feedback
  Does the employee regularly receive recognition for job performance?  And coaching to sustain, or improve, results?  Do supervisors serve as mentors, actively encouraging an employee’s professional development?  Do they provide what the employee considers appropriate opportunities to learn and grow? 
• Connection
  Do supervisors and managers show employees how the company business mission relates to their specific job?  Do they actively ensure that all members of the team deliver consistent, high-quality work?  Do supervisors and managers show they care about their employees – as people?  Do they seek out their employees’ perspectives and make them feel that their (i.e., the employee's) opinions make a difference?

These areas may feel beside-the-point – like things that would be “nice” to do, in context of meeting larger business goals.  But the reality is that they’re vital, in companies where employees affect the organization’s performance.  After all, numbers don’t lie.  And, in both the Gallup surveys, and those we do for clients, high scores in these areas correlate to high levels of employee commitment.  And low scores correlate to hordes of “actively disengaged” employees, which, as Gallup shows, eventually undermine an organization.

How much can these disengaged employees hurt?  A lot, according to the Gallup Organization.  As their report notes, "the lower productivity of actively disengaged workers costs the U.S. economy about $300 billion a year." 

 

So, before scrolling any further down, please stop for a moment.  Make a quick note of where you think your employees fall on the Engaged / Not Engaged / Actively Disengaged scale.  Then have a look below – at the numbers nationwide.

Survey Says . . .

According to the Gallup data, here’s where U.S. employees score:                   

Engaged                        29%

Not Engaged                  54%

Actively Disengaged       17%

Our own database reflects a cleaner 20 / 60 / 20 split (which, by the way, tracks with Ms. Bardwick’s figures).  Still, it’s not a pretty picture.  In your case, you can safely assume that only about one in four of your people has truly bought into your organization’s business mission – or feels an active sense of involvement in its success.

And, if your HR-communication strategy is less than stellar, the number of engaged employees in is probably closer to one in five.  (Please note that, by “strategy,” we mean not a series of booklets, but a dynamic, organized process – with defined steps, accountabilities, and measurable outcomes.)

What this Means to You

The main message here is that the things most employers think motivate their people – like pay, incentives, and benefits – are not what employees tell us actually motivate them.  Repeatedly, employees say they value most the things that organizations take for granted, but don’t really do well – like reinforcing the quality of the work experience, and (even more important with a mobile work force) establishing a strong sense of connection to the organization.

Seems counterintuitive, you say?  The overwhelming weight of survey data (both Gallup’s and our own) strongly suggests otherwise. 

And, as the numbers show, doing a good job in such areas as managing expectations, providing feedback, and creating connections, aren’t just “nice” things to do.  They’re they things that can make you. 

Or break you.

Want to find out how your organization is doing at engaging employees?  We’re offering a 25% discount on all survey services between now and the end of December – and 50% off survey-and-focus-group packages.  Click here for more information, or email us at info@strategicplanningassociates.com.